Review: Call of Duty Black Ops Multiplayer (360/PS3)

The seventh game in the Call of Duty series, Call of Duty: Black Ops, hit shelves November 9th. With everyone having such high expectations of this game, I couldn't help but have a gut feeling that this game wouldn't live up to the hype. Luckily, my gut feeling was wrong.

To be honest, my only initial interest in getting this game was for the zombie mode, because who doesn't love slaughtering zombies? Imagine my surprise, then, when I found that I enjoyed the rest of the online play as well. In fact, it seems a bit better than Modern Warfare 2's online play, with a lot of changes and added features. Some of these are admittedly the same, just with different names though. One that particularly stands out to me is the Second Chance feature, which gives your teammates the opportunity to revive you once you unlock pro... as long as you aren't a team killer or anything, in which case you might be out of luck. Clan tags, titles, and emblems are now all fully customizable, with the ability to create your own from a variety of icons to choose from. Unfortunately, all this customization isn't free, and like all the guns and equipment, have to be unlocked and purchased. Fortunately, the new Wager Match option, which allows you to bet on the outcome of your games, makes it easier to acquire the cash for all these new things.

While there are a lot of changes and new additions, there are unfortunately some things that got taken away. The biggest example of this is the lack of Commando Mode, which is unfortunate for all you knifers out there. In addition, the knife is actually much harder to wield in general in this Call of Duty than any of the other games in the series. The nukes are also gone, and have been replaced with... dogs. Yes, dogs. They are back, and they are harder then ever. Both dogs and gunships require an 11 kill-streak to acquire, which is now the highest streak available in the game, down from 25 in previous installments. While that is a bit of a shame, it fortunately does not take away from the game's fun factor.

Overall, I'm really enjoying this Call of Duty, and even the single player campaign has been a blast so far, with a story that seems much better than the games in the rest of the series. It really is outstanding, so much so that I don't want to spoil anything for you. You'll just have to pick up a copy of Black Ops today, if you haven't done so already.

Submitted By: Layanie Ahlers (Employee)